Homemade Butter
Ashley Burkhart Walker
Sometime after my mom passed, someone gifted me this little crystal angel with purple wings. Unbeknownst to the sweet person who gave it to me, purple was my mom’s favorite color. I held on to this angel, trying to decide where she would go. I wanted a special, meaningful place. She hung out on my counter for a while, awaiting her spot. Then the first wheat harvest without my mom approached, and I quietly slipped into her role of grain cart driver.
Holidays are one thing, but for a farming family, there is no time I have felt more grief than harvest time. It was quite possibly the biggest absence I had felt up to that point. Grief’s shadow was so big it filled the tractor cab every moment I was in there, then it would follow me home each night on the dark, quiet dirt roads.
I ran the grain cart when I was younger and here and there as time went on, but after I left the house, that job was my mom’s. To the grandkids, that was “granny’s tractor”. A fourth of the photos I have of her have got to be of her sitting in that tractor cab with one of the grandkids in her buddy seat.
That little crystal angel ended up in the tractor cab with me when I ended up in my mom’s seat. I hooked it over the CB, so it just hung there, swaying and glinting in the sun. She stays there and greets me every harvest. So, that’s where I’ve been this past week, getting some grain cart time with my angel mom watching over me, giving me all the strength to not mess up when I’m told to do some crazy grain cart operator task. It’s like an obstacle course sometimes with mud, ditches, trees, and powerline poles.
I’ve closed my eyes to the disaster the house has been all week, as the rest of the family has kept the cows and chickens happy, along with getting themselves fed, so I can’t ask anything more than that. Except, well, I did ask them to hand churn butter. The floors can get dirty and counters can stay cluttered, but I really don’t want to waste any of that beautiful Jersey cream.
Have a wonderful week, you all. Find us on Facebook: Vintage at Heart Homestead Did you know you could make homemade butter with store-bought cream? We handchurn our butter in an antique butter churn, but you can make it in your blender as well!
HOMEMADE BUTTER
Heavy whipping cream or cream skimmed from raw milk Salt 1. Blend heavy or whipping cream on medium- high in a blender. (First, you’ll get whipped cream, then the fat and liquid will separate, forming butter and buttermilk.
2. Pour off as much of the buttermilk as you can.
3. Scoop the butter into very cold water. Knead and squeeze it to release any remaining buttermilk. Wash in several changes of water until it remains clear.
4. Stir in salt to taste. 5. Store wrapped in parchment paper in the refrigerator for about a week or well-wrapped in the freezer for longer.
